Yesterday at dawn, I'd put down one walker and Dale was being buried. Today at dawn, I've put down dozens of walkers and my dad and I are on a motorcycle getting away from more.

Dad knows where we're going. He must. I want him to pull over, I want us to talk. But nowhere's safe. Except where he's taking us. Wherever that is.

We're on a dirt road now, a road scattered with cars and the walking dead. This is a bad part of the road. Dad takes a turn, a sharp one, his foot down to keep us upright, and they're close, so many walkers, so close. Reaching and hungry. We speed off and for a while there's peace. Or something like it. The dawn helps. My favorite time of the day. Not even the walkers can take that away from me.

. . . . .

We meet Glenn first. Glenn and Maggie in Shane's car. Close to the highway. Then we meet Carol and T-Dog and Beth and Lori, all crammed in a truck even closer to our destination.

There's no finding them. There's no searching out. They were already coming to the highway, which is where Dad has been heading towards, of course. Back to the highway, where everything started. Where the RV broke down and Carl and I shared a Snickers and the herd came through and chased away Sophia. The highway.

The others . . . They're alright, they're safe, they're alive, we're a group. But we're not whole.

It's an hour into morning when we finally reach the highway, so the sun's shining and it's beautiful and familiar. The cars light up, dazzlingly bright, decorations on the gray asphalt, the boring grass, the shady forest. Our motorcycle leads the two cars in, my dad great at getting through this, this lake of cars.

My dad. I love him so much.

I don't know if my dad sees them first or if I do. Maybe it's at about the same time, because I think Dad starts slowing the bike down just around when my eyes catch on the three people standing behind a red station wagon with their guns out. And of course they aren't just any three people. Of course, somehow, they're Rick and Hershel and Carl. Carl, his dad's hat on his head, my dad's gun in his hand. Carl.

Dad brings the motorcycle to a stop just a little ways from them, in a small clearing the lake of cars has left for us. Trash is scattered across the ground, still, and I can see the white car I got the Snickers from just over there. But was it me? It was so long ago . . .

The motorcycle quiets and I swing my leg over the seat and jump down. I'm shaky. I grab my dad's knee to steady me. My eyes find Carl's. Things happen around me – my dad and Rick shake hands, the cars park and people get out. But for just a second, one second, it's blue eyes on blue eyes, kid to kid.

He's alive.

He smiles at me.

My friend.

Then someone's thanking God. Lori. Carl's gone, then, racing off to his mother. She's crying. Rick's right behind his son, and then arms wrap around me from behind. Dad. I've been with him all night, but it feels like we've barely seen each other. I hold onto his arms and rest my head on one of them as the reunions around us continue. The Grimes family on their knees, hugging. Beth curled up against her father while Maggie leans into them both. Carol speaking behind me, Dad speaking back. Rick standing and speaking, then Dad talking again. Rick smiling and then not smiling anymore. That means I'd best start listening. I don't want to, I'm so tired. But I need to pay attention, I need to hear.

". . . the only ones who've made it so far," Rick says.

Lori rises to her feet, grin fading. "Shane?"

Rick shakes his head.

That means Shane's dead.

I look at Carl but he's looking at the ground. His smile's gone, too. Where did he go last night? What happened? I hold my dad's arms closer.

"Andrea?" Glenn asks. His neck is splattered with blood.

"She saved me, then I lost her," answers Carol softly. "We saw her go down."

Andrea? Andrea . . .

It goes on like that. Hershel asks after Patricia, she got pulled away from Beth. Beth asks after Jimmy, Rick saw him go down in the RV . . . when it got overrun. The RV, Dale's RV. Nowhere to be found. Overrun. Left at the farm.

Carol goes back to discussing Andrea. Asks the others if they're sure they saw her go down, because maybe Carol just saw something else.

"There were walkers everywhere . . ." says Lori.

"Did you see her?" presses Carol.

Nobody answers.

My dad pulls his arms from me. Steps toward the bike. "I'ma go back."

Forget being tired. Forget being hungry. My hands clamp onto one of Dad's so quickly and strongly that you'd never guess how low on fuel I am. "Dad, no!"

Rick says No at the same time I do. Rick's a good leader. I like Rick. Dad's stopped, his hand still trapped between both of mine, and his eyes go from me to Rick. "We can't just leave her."

"But we don't even know if she's there!" I insist, breath hard to find. He's not leaving. Not after tonight, not after everything, not after what I saw at that farm. He's not going back, I'm not letting him.

"She isn't there," Rick says. "She isn't. She's somewhere else, or she's dead. There's no way to find her."

That's harsh. That's cold. But Dad's still. So okay, Rick, okay, you're right.

"So we're not even going to look for her?" Glenn says.

"We gotta keep movin'," answer Rick. "There've been walkers crawlin' all over here."

At first I think I'm imagining the growl. I do that sometimes, when I'm really tired – I think I hear something or see something that doesn't exist. But not this time. This time I look past my dad as T-Dog's talking about heading east, and I see it, I see a real, moving walker. In a checkered sweater like my Papaw might have worn. I squeeze Dad's hand and nod at it, but I think he's already seen. He gently pulls away from me and goes for his crossbow. "Stay off the main roads," he says to the group as he gets the weapon from my uncle's bike, "The bigger the road, the more walkers – the more assholes like this one." He's in front of the motorcycle, he's raising his crossbow. "I got him."

And he gets him.

It.

. . . . .

Dad pulls me to the side a minute later. He literally takes me to the side of the road, actually, and he crouches down to my eye level. "You ever eat anything?" he asks, which – whether I'm hungry or not – is the most insignificant question I've ever heard. That somehow makes me smile, though. Somehow I smile.

"Yeah. Some bread and an apple."

He nods. He's tired, too. There are circles under his eyes. But we're leaving in just a minute, no rest, not yet. We have to get out of here. Go east. Dad's sleepy eyes scan over my head and land back on me. "Want you to ride with Rick and them. Get some sleep."

"No, I wanna ride with you."

"No, Syd."

"Dad –"

"Y'know, the older you get, the more'n more you get like your mom. Can't help but argue, can ya?" He straightens out my new jacket. He doesn't ask where I got it, probably just guesses. It occurs to me that I left his shirt back at the house, along with nearly everything else to my name – and now I'm about to freak out, because Mom's picture – no, no, Mom's picture is in one of the motorcycle bags. We're good.

Dad, he says, "You just do what I tell ya for now, and we can squabble 'bout it later, 'kay?"

As if I'll ever be able to change his mind once he's got it set. "'Kay."

"Daryl!" Rick calls. Dad and me both turn to him. He's over by the red station wagon he was beside when I first spotted him. We're ditching the truck for that thing, which has better gas mileage, apparently. "Ready when you are."

Dad gives a nod. Then there's a pause. "Hey."

I wait.

"You really kicked ass."

And it's cold this morning, so cold, but that makes me warm inside and I smile. Then I stop. Because this doesn't make sense. "Dad. Why didn't you want me to kill that first walker?"

He'll know what I mean. The one in the woods, in the basketball shorts, tall and easy to hit and ready to be taken down.

"'Cause," he says to my jacket.

"Dad."

He moves his hands to my arms. "It don't matter, Little Bit. Not anymore."

I stare at him and will him to change his mind. But when he looks me right in the eye, I know he hasn't. He's standing now. "What matters is that I'm damn proud of you." Then he swipes at my head and I dodge away. I'm still fast, even though I'm tired.

And he said he's proud of me. Actually said it.

"Go on, get in the car."

And so I go, walking with my hands in my jacket pockets. I head straight towards the red station wagon, which means I pass by a few other cars, and one of them has a stack of ruined food on top of it. A message scribbled in white on the windshield. One word is still readable, just one: Sophia.

I brush my fingers over the car's cool surface as I pass.

. . . . .

Rick drives the station wagon. T-Dog rides passenger, Lori gets the right back window and I get the left. Carl's in the middle. His dad's hat – his hat – rests on his knee. There's an open science book in his lap from the second I get in the car. He works problems for ten minutes or so, barely speaking. I'm feeling a little irritated by it, really, until there's finally a point when he glances over to his Mom – her head is against the window and her eyes are outside – and then casually slides half of the book into my lap.

At the bottom of the page, next to a picture of a giraffe eating leaves, is a scribbled note.

Shane turned. I put him down.

I reread this note three times before I check Lori and then take the pencil from Carl's hand.

You good?

He takes the pencil back.

Had to be done.

What do I say? I'm sorry? No. It's like when he told me his mom was pregnant, and I couldn't tell him congratulations. It just doesn't fit, not when it's between us.

So instead I write:

You: 1

Me: 50

Your move, city boy.

And when Carl reads this, he smiles. Shane's dead, Carl blew out the brains of walker-Shane, and Carl's smiling.

But I'm smiling, too, so what does that say about me?